By Orin Davidson
This is not the time for grandstanding by anyone, be it players, board officials or selectors.
Guyana’s qualification for the Airtel Champions League Twenty20 cricket championship was due to the collective effort of all the stakeholders involved.
Thus , the achievement ought not get to anyone’s heads, lest Guyana’s chances for success in South Africa be marginalized.
Which is why the national selectors should do the right thing and select the strongest Guyana team possible for this assignment of utmost importance next month.
The final touring team has not yet been determined , but already there are suggestions that stipulations would prevent specific players from making the cut.
Chief selector Claude Raphael was recently quoted, stating that players not included in the original list including standbys, for the West Indies Twenty20 championship, are likely to be ineligible for the Airtel Champions League.
If such is the policy, it is where the first wrong steps will be made and which will kill the team’s chances of having its best squad to represent the country .
Guyana’s most illustrious active player Shivnarine Chanderpaul was not included in that list as he chose to play in the English County Championships instead.
Rajendra Chandrika also was unavailable because he was attending the West Indies Cricket Board’s High Performance Center’s training programme. So was Veerasammy Permaul. If as a result these players are made ineligible, it smacks of excessive authority by the selectors that could do more harm than good to Guyana’s chances.
In Chanderpaul’s case he made an unpopular decision to play for Lancashire instead, but it does not mean he should be penalized, after 19 years distinguished service to his country. These are modern times that have long transformed sport into a business for its participants and cricketers are no exception.
Chanderpaul obviously stood to earn much more money playing for Lancashire and he went for it, an act that has become the norm rather than the exception these days for modern day professionals.
And for players of Chanderpaul’s status and age it is a no- brainer.
At 36 years of age the Guyanese is at the sunset of a career that will end sooner rather than later. Thus the first priority of players in his situation is to maximize their earnings to the hilt, and in Chanderpaul’s case, his is a special one because of other factors which may have contributed to his decision. After dedicating a life time to a sports discipline you don’t expect sportspeople to start life all over again after retirement.
So, the selectors have to understand that the old days of amateurism and unequivocal loyalty to national teams which comprised of merely one national competition per year for Guyanese players, are long gone.
Regional players have to deal with thrice that number of territorial competitions presently and if Chanderpaul forsakes one, it is not a criminal act.
His behaviour is not even close to the heinous self serving, manipulative acts performed by professional sports people in America and Europe on teams all the time, to earn maximum money.
Right here in the West indies, Keiron Pollard chose to play for Somerset in the said English county championships instead of representing the West Indies ` A’ team. And there was no talk of any sanction.
In an age when international sports ruling bodies are constantly changing the rules to allow countries to select competitors with merely the faintest of links to give them the strongest representation possible at world competitions, the thinking of the GCB selectors is archaic and out of place. Thus, Chanderpaul ought to be in the Guyana team where his accomplishments and experience would be a big asset to its chances for success in South Africa.
With more than five tours under his belt there, Shiv’s knowledge of the vastly alien South African conditions would be invaluable for the Guyana lineup, most of who have never played outside of the West Indies. And forget any argument of his game not being suited for T20 cricket which is all about fast scoring. Lest anyone forget he is the scorer of the third fastest Test century ever made in a mere 69 balls. He has been involved in many acts of ferocious scoring for West Indies at the top, middle and bottom of the order.
The 16 runs he plundered off one over against New Zealand in St Vincent to win the fifth game and One Day International series in 2002 readily comes to mind. The 149-run 136- ball classic off India in Nagpur is another, and only the critics with short memory will forget the many exhilarating opening partnerships he fashioned with Chris Gayle at the top of the order for West Indies including the 2006 ICC Champions Trophy series.
Also, Chanderpaul’s batting is not all he has to offer, as his fielding is so exemplary being second to none in the entire West Indies squad. Imagine the boost it will bring to the Guyana line in a scenario where fielding is of utmost importance in the shortest form of the game.
The West Indies selectors did not make him the team’s T20 opening batsman for nothing other than his ability at the crease and in the outfield.
Guyana captain Ramnaresh Sarwan knew all of this before he called for Chanderpaul’s selection just after winning the CT20 final.
In previewing the Champions League, a few days later, former India captain Sourav Ganguly, did not give a vague overview of Guyana’s chances. He specifically mentioned Chanderpaul as one of the country’s best players ever.
The left-hander of 126 Tests and 261 ODIs experience, can adjust to any type of attacking game needed . He has done it against all types of opposition and conditions and it will be a gross injustice to the Guyana team and the Guyanese people if a less accomplished player is selected instead. The cases of the two High Performance Center players are somewhat different to Chanderpaul’s but no less compelling. They were unavailable for the CT20 series for reasons beyond their control and deserved to be considered for selection.
More so in the case of Chandrika, a batsman with a natural flair for aggressive stroke play. He already has proven his class at international level by spearheading Guyana to victory over Trinidad and Tobago, the regining Champions League runners-up at the time, in the Haiti earthquake T20 fund raising game in the Twin Island republic earlier this year. It was an innings described as a “vicious assault” on the T&T bowlers by the Trinidad Express newspaper.
With these factors in mind the national selectors must rethink their policy with level-headed thinking and understand that this massive assignment in South Africa is not about them and the authority they hold. Rather, it is all about the Guyanese fans and the benefits to the nation, which can only be acquired with the strongest team being selected. By the time the Champions League starts, Lancashire will still have a handful of four-day and 40 overs games left to complete their county season.
It means the selectors or Guyana Board will do well to start negotiating for Chanderpaul’s release.
The selection panel did an excellent job in determining the team for the CT20 series.
But they could tarnish it with needless regulations for the much bigger challenge next month.
